Kern Oil Field - Kern County, CA Oil Field

Occidental Petroleum ( OXY ) recently announced the biggest oil discovery in California in over 35 years. This discovery is located in Kern County, CA and is being referred to as the " Kern Field. " Occidental estimates that there could be roughly 150-200 million gross barrels of oil and natural gas equivalents. OXY currently has 1.1 million acres of leaseholds and believe this field could be extended pending further tests.

Occidental Petroleum owns 80% of the Kern Oil field while Chevron ( CVX ) owns the rest. Anther thing to note is that this field is a conventional source but they are looking into tapping the unconventional shale portions at a later time.

Occidental Petroleum Announces Significant California Oil and Gas Discovery

July 22, 2009 - Occidental Petroleum Corporation (OXY) announced today that it has made a significant discovery of oil and gas reserves in Kern County, California.

Occidental believes there are between 150 million and 250 million gross barrels of oil equivalent (BOE) reserves within the outlined area where Oxy has drilled six wells to date to delineate the discovery. The multi-pay zone discovery area, whose areal geological extent is still being defined, has both conventional and unconventional pay zones. The bulk of the discovery's producing zones are conventional oil and gas bearing formations.

Occidental's interest in the discovery area is approximately 80 percent. Approximately two-thirds of the discovery is believed to be natural gas.

"We believe this to be the largest new oil and gas discovery made in California in more than 35 years," said Dr. Ray R. Irani, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Occidental Petroleum Corporation.

"It is probable that there are additional reserves outside the defined area, and it is possible that structures of this type exist elsewhere in Oxy's 1.1 million net acre position in California. We plan to drill wells to exploit these opportunities over the next 5 to 10 years," Dr. Irani said.

Oxy is currently the largest natural gas producer and third-largest oil producer in the state of California, where the company has produced oil and gas for more than 50 years. Oxy's assets in the state include more than 7,500 active wells located in 90 fields, spanning 600 miles. Oxy's California proved reserves were 708 million BOE at year-end 2008 and represent approximately 24 percent of Oxy's worldwide reserves

April 2010 Update - The Kern County discovery area expected to show modest improvement during the second quarter. The production continues to be constrained by the lack of additional processing capacity. More significant increase are expected to occur late in the second quarter, when we add the skid amount of gas processing facilities.

We're continuing with drilling and completed a number of cells. We have sufficient completed wells to fill the entire capacity of the skid mounted processing facilities. Our oil production is also constrained by the lack of gas processing capacity, since these wells also produce natural gas.

Other Companies Drilling in the Kern Oil Field:

Plains Exploration - PXP is evaluating its exposure to the recently announced positive industry discovery in Kern County, California. The discovery area is under evaluation and apparently consists of conventional oil and gas bearing formations. PXP holds approximately 9,800 net acres in the Kern County area.